Seaforde couple join expedition to Mount Fuji in aid of Parkinson’s charity

Seaforde couple join expedition to Mount Fuji in aid of Parkinson’s charity

24 July 2019

EARLIER this month Seaforde couple John and Heather Knipe joined a group of 16 people from seven different countries as they attempted to climb Mount Fuji, Japan’s highest mountain, in aid of The Cure Parkinson’s Trust. 

The expedition leader was Kilkeel man Johnny Ward whose mother, 70 year-old Maura Ward is a Parkinson’s sufferer and was also in the group of intrepid climbers. Amy Morris, another Kilkeel resident, also volunteered for the climb.

The group assembled in Tokyo on Saturday, July 7 and the next day set off by rail for the town of Fujiyoshida which is within sight of Mount Fuji. The mountain is 12,389 feet in altitude which is approximately four times the height of Slieve Donard.

The climb started with everyone in the party arriving at a mountain shelter by early evening in time for a light meal and a few hours rest before the final ascent to the summit.

The group were back up again before midnight and set out with the aid of head-torches to reach the summit. The climbers were treated to a beautiful sunrise around 4.30am and after admiring nature’s beauty for a little while, continued their climb. 

Unfortunately the altitude took its toll on the climbers and two succumbed to its effects and had to return to the bottom.

The remainder of the group were rewarded for their efforts by reaching the summit and getting a view into the enormous crater of the dormant volcano. 

Reaching the summit held two very personal extra special moments for John and Heather, who celebrated her 65th birthday as they climbed.

Also, they carried a specially laminated copy of the funeral service of their friend, Simon Harper, who died suddenly just before Easter. Simon had climbed Fuji several years previously and had been offering advice and encouragement to them as they prepared for the climb. 

The group were accompanied by a professional film crew, complete with a drone, who focussed on how Maura was coping with the climb with her condition. It is hoped that the completed film will be taken by a commercial broadcaster early in 2020 and will take the theme of ‘At what age were you born?’ — in other words, when did you really start to live life to the full? 

Maura led a relatively normal life of a single parent up until her early sixties when she developed a love of budget backpacking and visited many different countries around the world, sometimes on her own and sometimes accompanied by her son, Johnny. Johnny lives in Thailand and has travelled to every country in the world, blogging as he goes.

Then Maura got some bad news. Johnny noticed a tremor in her left leg in 2012. They hoped it was a trapped nerve. It didn’t go away. By 2013, it was worse, and Maura was off to see a neurologist with the diagnosis of Parkinson’s Disease.

Parkinson’s Disease is a chronic brain illness which affects the part of the brain that controls how the body moves. It’s often noticed that sufferers have an uncontrollable tremor or shaking of their limbs, but it has lots of other symptoms too. 

Rather than let Parkinson’s define her, Maura decided to use it as motivation to live life for the moment. She didn’t know how long her health would last, so instead of moping around the house, she decided to travel more, further, to have more adventures.

She sky-dived for Parkinson’s charity for her 65th birthday, raising over £5,000. She travelled solo to Africa — to countries like Burkina Faso, Eritrea, where she thought nothing of throwing her clothes in a backpack and taking an night train to Armenia. 

The members of the group were spurred on by the very generous sponsorship they had received — £13,758 to date — but were reminded of the saying about the sacred Mount Fuji – a wise man will climb it once, but only a fool would climb it twice.

There was a great feeling of accomplishment by the members of the group. Months of preparation and training had paid off, the mountain had been conquered and the target of £10,000 had been well and truly beaten.

The group returned to Tokyo for a few days sight-seeing before returning to their homes scattered across the globe with promises of meeting up again in the not so distant future.

John’s GoFundMe page is still open for donations and can be found at emailing him at jaknipe@btinternet.com.